


Make Your Own Luck

by oxiosa



Series: Brarg Week 2019 [1]
Category: Hetalia - Fandom, Latin Hetalia - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:27:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21526735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oxiosa/pseuds/oxiosa
Summary: Normally, closing the shop takes half the time Luciano is taking, but that’s because normally Luciano’s father is here with him to help him out. Tonight his father has gone on an errand to deliver some packages and buy some ingredients for his personal apothecary, and while he will be back soon - for they are still missing Luciano’s nightly lessons -, Luciano is left to close the shop on his own.
Relationships: Argentina/Brazil (Hetalia)
Series: Brarg Week 2019 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1551520
Comments: 4
Kudos: 3





	Make Your Own Luck

**Author's Note:**

> The characters used in this work belong to the community Latin Hetalia and their respective creators. More info about them in the following link > www.latin-hetalia.livejournal.com
> 
> Fem!Argentina: Martina Hernández  
> Brazil: Luciano Da Silva.

It’s not the first time Luciano has closed his father’s shop on his own, and it certainly won’t be last, but still it wonders him just so quiet the place is when all customers are up and gone about with their lives and back to their homes.

The coffee shop seems almost lifeless, empty and dark in the dim light of the old hanging lanterns and the dying embers in the fireplace. Today’s last client is long gone, but the smell of coffee and pastries still lingers in the air, sugary and bittersweet. Thunder rumbles up above, loud and sudden, and rain falls mercilessly outside in a rather scary display of nature’s raw power. Luciano frowns at the downpour through the shop’s wide front window; it had been such a sunny lovely day and this sudden storm came out of nowhere.

Normally, closing the shop takes half the time Luciano is taking tonight, but that’s because normally Luciano’s father is here with him to help him out. Tonight his father has gone on an errand to deliver some packages and buy some ingredients for his personal apothecary, and while he will be back soon - for they are _still_ missing Luciano’s nightly lessons -, Luciano is left to close the shop on his own.

He cleans and puts away the last of today’s dirty dishes, swipes the tables and mops the floor. Iskander, his only company, sleeps on his perch by the cash register, an unhelpful snoring bundle of black feathers mostly concealed between the shadows. Luciano is crouching behind the counter, putting away the last of the clean cups and dishes, when he hears the merry bell ring at the front door announcing a new arrival.

“Sorry, we’re already closed!” he calls without bothering to look up.

He gets no answer, frowns to himself, and stands up.

“I said we’re… _oh._ ”

There’s a girl about his age standing by the front door. She is soaked wet, dripping all over the freshly mopped floor, her hair and clothes clinging to her slim frame and weighing her down. She ignores Luciano, too focused on cursing softly to herself under her breath as she desperately rummages through her bag.

“Oh, thank God you’re ok,” she lets out a relieved sigh when she fishes her mostly-dry cellphone out.

Now that she has found what she had been looking for, she looks up and Luciano is speechless, pinned into place by wide beautiful green eyes.

“I won’t be ordering anything, I promise,” she excuses herself, still a little breathless from what must have been a race for shelter from the storm. “I just need a moment out of the rain.”

As in queue, thunder rumbles outside, lounder and meaner than before.

“It’s ok,” Luciano says, a little too breathless himself. He shakes his head, clear his throat. “Come on, come inside.”

She steps out of her shoes, and takes her soaked coat off and hangs it by the door. The dress she is wearing is a little wet too, testament of the storm’s wrath, but it’s not dripping a puddle of rainwater on the floor like her coat current is. Luciano guides her inside, takes her to a big old cozy armchair by the fireplace before excusing himself and heading back to the counter. He quickly prepares a steaming cup of coffee and makes a quick escape to the kitchen to steal a plate of cornstarch sugar cookies to take back to the front. He places the coffee and the cookies on a tray and takes them to his new guest, who awaits for him combing her hair, carefully untangling the wet golden strands with her fingers.

She seems a little surprised by the coffee and the food Luciano places in front of her.

“On the house,” he smiles encouragingly.

“Oh… thank you,” she takes the hot cup between her hands, a little uncertainty, and cradles it close to her chest. She blows at the steam, and looks at Luciano cautiosly. “Thought you said you were closed.”

“Won’t tell if you don’t,” Luciano shrugs nonchalantly, takes a seat on the armchair opposite to hers and steals a cookie from the plate.

She gives him a small crooked smirk, and takes a careful sip of her coffee. She closes her eyes with a happy sigh and Luciano can’t help to smile and puff his chest with a little bit of pride.

“I’m Luciano,” he introduces himself.

“Martina,” she answers, her eyes still closed as she savors the bitterness and warmth of her drink.

She takes another careful sip, shudder and let out a rather inelegant sneeze.

“Oh, sorry,” Luciano’s eyes go wide with realisation. “Here, let me give you a hand.”

He stands and takes a log from the firewood storage by the fireplace, and throws it into the smoldering embers that are left of the fire that had burnt bright through the day. With a snap of Luciano's fingers, the fire comes back to life in an unnatural wild burst of flames.

“Oh!” Martina exclaims, blinks at the sudden burning fire and then at Luciano. She stares at him a little startled. “You’re a sorcerer!”

Luciano, technically, is no sorcerer. _Yet._

He comes from a long line of sorcerers - while his family now mostly works and benefits from their little coffee shop, his father _is_ a sorcerer, and a powerful one. Luciano is merely his father’s apprentice; he helps his dad with business, working on small charms and simple potions, but he has got still many years of studies and practice ahead of him to be considered a proper sorcerer.

But Martina looks at him with wide green eyes full of uncontained wonder.

“Yeah… I mean, yes!” he answers, puffs his chest a little and to look convincing. “I am. A sorcerer. I’m a sorcerer.”

A loud caw, suspiciously similar to an unabashed crack of laughter, startles them both.

Iskander has woken, and currently is staring at them with a rather unimpressed look. Standing proud now in full height, he is startlingly big for a raven, with unnervingly clever eyes. He flaps his wings at them, and lets out another loud rude caw.

“Ignore him,” Luciano rolls his eyes.

Iskander croaks at Luciano again, loud and angry, before focusing on their new guest. He studies Martina for a moment, slowly turns his head to the side to get a good look at her. He makes a show to stare from head to toe, before turning his head back towards Luciano to let out a flat judgeful sound.

Luciano can feel his face heat up - his intentions will not be judged by a _bird_.

“He’s… your pet?” Martina asks with uncertainty.

“He’s my family’s familiar,” Luciano replies. Iskander has been with his family for a long time - longer than a raven’s natural lifespan, or several humans’ put together for the matter. “He’s harmless, mostly.”

He ignores Iskander’s laughter again.

“A familiar, uh… Then you truly are a sorcerer,” Martina mumbles, mostly to herself. She takes another sip of coffee and looks around the shop curiously. “I’ve never been to a sorcerer’s café before.”

Magic is a dying arts these days, one only old superstitious women believe in and teen kids are curious enough to willingly spend their money on. What so many years ago had been a prosperous business now is not enough to cover a living. That’s why Luciano’s father built their coffee shop and why Luciano spends most of his time serving coffee and cakes rather than crafting charms and mixing potions. There are little to non sorcerers still on business.

“I haven’t heard of many,” Luciano can’t help to smile with amusement.

To his delight, Martina does snort.

“No, you’re right,” she agrees. She keeps looking around. “So, what do you offer here?”

“Tea and coffee, of course. Buns, scones, pastries...” Luciano lists. “My dad actually bakes this awesome banana cake-”

Her laughter interrupts him again.

“I mean witchcraft,” Martina rolls her eyes with a wicked smirk.

“Oh,” Luciano blinks. “Well, charms mostly. We also sell potions. Though people usually come for the tea leaves and coffee ground readings.”

The moment the words leave his mouth, an idea sparks to life in his mind.

“Would you like one?” he blurts.

“A potion?” she asks with a frown.

“A reading.”

Martina blinks at him, her eyebrows rising up.

“Now?”

“Sure,” Luciano smiles, scotts a little closer to the edge of his seat. “We’ve got a cup of coffee, a sorcerer, and free time, right?”

Martina stares at him for a moment, searching in his eyes, before the corner of her lips curve upward. She drinks the last of her coffee, and offers Luciano the cup. Luciano takes it, purposefully and gently gracing his fingers against hers in the process with shared coy smiles.

Luciano comes from a family renown by their reading abilities. It is not a learnt art, but a talent some sorcerers have and others simply don’t. Much to his father’s not-so-secret disappointment, Luciano lacks the skill.

But Luciano has seen his dad do this plenty of times to put up a little show for his guest.

He covers the cup with the saucer, turns it upside down, and waits for a whole minute in which they both remain silent, the cracking fire and the pouring rain outside the only sound echoing in the coffee shop. Luciano turns the coffee cup up again, takes the saucer off, and stares into the dark brown paths of coffee smeared around the white porcelain with a frown of deep concentration.

“I see…” he says. He takes a second, then another. He hums to himself. “I see… I see love.”

“Love?” Martina perks up.

“A boy,” he continues like he didn’t hear her interruption. “A handsome young man. Talented and charming. Dark skin, dark hair, deep brown eyes and a bright smile.”

He looks up to give her his very brighest smile, which grows wider when he catches Martina shaking her head and biting her lower lip to keep from smiling.

“What else?” she prompts, invested in their game.

Luciano looks back down at the cup, committed to his role.

“You like him right away,” he announces. “It’s like magic, an immediate conexion. Sparks fly, birds sing, the sun comes out and all that jazz. Truly love at first sight.”

Martina hides a soft snort behind her hand.

“And?” she demands.

“I see…” Luciano makes a show of giving the coffee cup a little twirl. “I see… I see movies. The theatre by the shopping centre,” he looks up from the cup, stares right into her mirthful green eyes. “Friday night, around 7?”

“Do I get to pick the movie?” she asks, nodding her head towards the cup.

“Oh, definitely,” he nods without bothering to keep up his charade anymore. “Popcorn and soda too.”

Martina laughs, openly delighted, but before she can give him an answer her phone rings. She takes a look, and then looks up at Luciano with a smirk lingering on the corner of her lips.

“That’d be my ride,” she announces and stands up. “Thank you. For the coffee and the reading. It was fun.”

Luciano watches her march to the front door and pick up her things.

“Will I see you on friday then?” he calls.

“Oh, I don’t know,” she smirks again. She adds, with a mischief glint in her eyes. “Maybe you could use a reading yourself.”

Martina is half way out of the door when she stops with her hand on the knob. Without a word or a look in Luciano’s direction, she turns around and marches to the counter to take a pen and a napkin and quietly scribbles over it. She elegantly slips the napkin into Luciano’s tip jar, and leaves.

Luciano remains seated, watches her run under the rain to the car waiting outside for her throught the shop's window. He waits, and the moment the car is gone he springs into action. He practically leaps towards the tip jar, tripping in the way. He reaches the counter, and freezes in place when he sees his father has materialized out from nowhere behind the bar, a possessive hand curled around the tip jar as he quietly reads the scribbled napkin with a bored expression.

“My son, always the gentleman,” his dad takes his pipe out of his mouth to lets out a long smoky sigh.

“I was just being nice to a customer,” Luciano replies back defensively.

“A customer?” his father blinks down at him, eyebrows going up in mock surprise. “Since when do customers get to consume goods and not pay for them?”

Luciano can feel his cheeks fire up as Iskander throws his head back and lets out a series of loud mirthful caws that can only be described as laughter.

“I’ll keep this today,” his father says shaking the heavy tip jar, his voice as stern and unyielding as his dark eyes now. “To make up for the coffee and cookies you so generously gave away.”

Luciano closes his hands into fists, and stays quiet; talking back has never done him no good. His father offers his forearm out, and Iskander jumps down his perch and glides down to land on it. He ruffles his feathers and gives Luciano a smug look.

“Finish closing up the shop,” his father orders and walks away with Luciano’s tips on one hand and a huge raven on the other. “You’re already late for today’s lesson.”

“Yes, dad,” he begrudgingly mutters.

Luciano watches his dad unhurriedly make his way to the back of the shop. He stops, looks back at Luciano over his shoulder for a moment.

“You can keep this one,” he says as he releases the scribbled napkin into the air.

The piece of fine paper twirls and whirls like a feather in the wind, and gracefully lands on Luciano’s reaching palms. His father is gone without another word, and Luciano stands in the empty coffee shop alone. He opens the napkin, and can’t help the painfully wide smile that stretches his lips when he sees the phone number scribbled down with a little cute heart at the end.

His father can say whatever he wants about Luciano’s poor fortune-telling skills; his readings about next friday night are come true.

**Author's Note:**

> ☑ Brarg Week - Day 1; Coffee Shop


End file.
